MANILA, Philippines -- A resolution demanding that Japan apologize for the sexual atrocities committed by its troops in the Philippines during World War II will be returned to the House committee on foreign affairs that adopted it for a re-vote.

Cebu City Rep. Antonio Cuenco, the foreign affairs committee chair, said a Japanese diplomat had expressed concern over the passage of House Resolution 124 and questioned the lack of a quorum when the committee adopted the resolution in March.

Cuenco said that while the Japanese don’t have any business questioning the proceedings of a House committee, a resolution calling for a foreign country to apologize and make compensation should not be spared from questions on its propriety.

The resolution urging the Philippine government to demand an apology and compensation from Japan for the sexual slavery of Filipino women -- known as comfort women -- by the Japanese Imperial Army was expected to be passed by the House once it resumed sessions on April 21.

‘Unanimous’

The committee, with just three members present, adopted the resolution unanimously on March 11.

Authored by party-list minority Rep. Liza Maza, it was supported by Cuenco and another senior administration lawmaker, Parañaque Rep. Eduardo Zialcita, and would have easily passed the plenary because of the bipartisan support for it.

“We have to convoke the committee again to vote on the resolution.... [They] questioned the quorum when it was passed,” Cuenco said in a telephone interview.

Cuenco said it was important that the committee vote again to approve the resolution with enough members because “without the support of 12 congressmen, our resolution will be prone to attack”.

The number of members needed to constitute a quorum in the foreign affairs panel is 12.

Cuenco rejected the suggestion that the House just get the signatures of 12 members for the resolution. He said he wanted the committee of 55 lawmakers to gather at least 12 of its members to vote and adopt the resolution.

‘On the level’

“We have to make sure that a resolution this important is passed on the level,” he said.

Though the Japanese embassy was not invited, First Secretary Yoshihisa Ishikawa attended the committee hearing on March 11 as an observer.

The diplomat talked with the committee secretary Imelda Apostol and other resource persons after the committee adopted the measure.

Cuenco said Ishikawa had expressed his concern to Apostol over the absence of a quorum when the resolution was adopted.

Cuenco said that when the committee adopted the measure, only three members -- himself, Maza and Nueva Vizcaya Rep. Carlos Padilla -- voted on it.

He explained that there was no quorum because many congressmen were in Malacañang for the signing of the General Appropriations Act of 2008.

The committee adopted the measure on March 11, two days before Congress went on recess.

Zialcita at the time said he expected the resolution to pass the plenary before the recess as it was a non-partisan issue which both majority and minority sides believed in.

Maza and co-author, party-list Rep. Luzvminda Ilagan, took a leaf from a similar resolution passed by the United States House of Representatives in July 2007.

Sexual slavery

The US resolution said that Japan should apologize “in clear and unequivocal manner over its Armed Forces’ coercion of young women into sexual slavery”.

The House resolution asked Japan to “acknowledge, apologize and accept its responsibility over the sexual slavery” of the comfort women and to provide compensation to the victims.

Aside from the US, other countries that have asked for Japan to apologize are the Netherlands and Australia.

In September 2001, the then Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi wrote to President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo apologizing for the atrocities committed against the comfort women.

But this was not enough to the militant Gabriela women’s group, of which Maza is a member.

“It was the Japanese Prime Minister’s apology, not Japan’s,” said Janice Monte, Gabriela information officer.

Monte said the compensation mechanism for Filipino comfort women was being handled by a Japanese private sector group.

“It should be from the Japanese government,” she said.